


The Music In You

by Yoursweatsmellslikecinnamon



Category: Pitch Perfect (Movies)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-29
Updated: 2018-01-29
Packaged: 2019-03-11 00:28:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13512963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yoursweatsmellslikecinnamon/pseuds/Yoursweatsmellslikecinnamon
Summary: Beca just wants to finish a piece of music she’s been working on, but when Chloe gets home she has other ideas - ideas that involve dancing with her favourite roommate.





	The Music In You

When Beca gets home early from a particularly frustrating studio day and drops her bag by the door, the first thing she notices is the quiet. She takes a deep breath and exhales, feeling the stress of the day come off her shoulders as she realises she is finally alone. Living with two other girls in a studio apartment doesn’t give her a lot of alone time, and she relishes these moments.

She moves around the room, changing into her sweats and grabbing an open bag of Doritos from the counter before settling at the table to set up her equipment. She doesn’t get many chances to work on her own stuff anymore, especially not at home in her own space. Amy doesn’t know how to entertain herself (Beca swears that’s why she always ends up getting into the kind of shit she does), and Chloe just likes to have conversation with people after spending all day with animals who can’t talk back. She doesn’t mind it most of the time - Amy is quality entertainment and a fiercely loyal friend, and Chloe is… well, Chloe - but she does miss sitting down without any distractions and shutting out the world as she gets lost in her music. She throws on her headphones, pulls up a loop she jotted down a couple of weeks ago and, after listening through a couple of times to find her place, gets lost in creating.

_________

As Chloe turns her key in the lock, she’s surprised not to hear any voices coming from inside. Usually by this time Amy and Beca would both be home, with Beca trying to do something useful while Amy distracts her with (at least partially-true) accounts of her day in the Fat Amy Winehouse box.

She walks in to find Beca sitting at the table with her back to the door, her ears covered by headphones almost as large as her head and squiggly lines all over her computer screen. She’s tapping her finger on the table along with what Chloe imagines is the beat she’s created, and doesn’t notice as the redhead kicks off her shoes and throws her bag on the bed. A quick scan of the empty bed behind the clothes rack and the open bathroom door tells her Amy isn’t here and for a full minute she stands watching her best friend engrossed in the music, tapping a rhythm Chloe can clearly follow. It’s upbeat, and if Beca’s nodding head and concentrated stare is anything to go by, it’s good.

Beca is drawn out of her zone by a sudden rush of cold air hitting her ears as her headphones are pulled back down around her neck.

“Chlo?” she asks before she spins around, knowing that even with the music blasting in her ears, Amy would never have made it in the door and right up behind her without creating some sort of alert to her presence.

“Hey Becs,” Chloe smiles, able to hear more of the sound now coming from around Beca’s neck. “What are you working on?”

“Oh, just some stuff,” Beca blushes. “It’s not any good yet, I’m not finished.” She knows she’s good at what she does, but the process to get to the final product can be slow and a bit messy. She never shares her work until it’s 100% done and she’s happy with it – which can cause problems at the label when she plays her track to an artist and they want to make changes to it. _No, this is it,_ she tries to persuade them. _This is what you want, trust me, that’s why I’m here – to make your track better._ It’s gotten her into trouble more than once, and lost her work from at least a couple of clients.

“Can I?” Chloe asks softly, gesturing towards the headphones.

“Chlo, it’s nothing yet. Please-“ but before she can finish her sentence, Chloe swoops down to the table over her shoulder and flicks the headphone jack out of Beca’s laptop.

“Boundaries, Beale,” Beca sulks as the loop she’s been creating fills the apartment. There’s a beat, with different drum sounds, a bassline that sounds like a cello, and random smatterings of other sounds and patterns. It really is just the skeleton of a track with a few bits being fleshed out and tried on for size, but nonetheless it’s catchy and Chloe’s foot starts tapping out the beat.

“Dance with me,” she instructs.

“Chloe, you can’t dance to this,” the aspiring producer grumbles as her best friend starts shimmying and twirling with the beat. ‘It’s not even music yet.”

“Beca Mitchell,” Chloe scolds, “I can dance to whatever I like. And you are going to join me.” She tries to pull Beca up from the chair, but the smaller girl is surprisingly strong. “You are going to dance with me whether you like it or not, grump,” she insists, “and if you don’t, I’ll tell Amy exactly where you hide the good cookies.” A sharp intake of breath is the desired result, and Beca doesn’t disappoint.

“Fine, fine, I’ll dance with you. But at least let me put on an actual song.” She turns back to the computer and selects a different mix, one which has a title the girl behind her can’t quite see. As the opening riff of Shakira’s ‘She Wolf’ starts, with an undercurrent of something else Chloe can’t quite place, Beca finally stands up and drops her headphones on the table, turning to face the infuriating redhead. She taps her foot to the beat a couple of times, arms folded, eyebrow raised, before Chloe grabs her arm and twirls her. It so doesn’t fit the song and is so unexpected that before she knows it, Beca finds herself giggling and giving in to the beat, leading Chloe in a series of cheesy dance moves that even as the Bellas they had rejected, but never forgotten.

It’s when Beca holds one hand up to her ear miming a cellphone and swings her other arm around her body that Chloe figures out Michael Jackson’s Bad is the other song in the mix. They had been planning to use it in a piece for the regional competition in Beca’s Junior year, but decided against it when they found out one of their competitors was the “Billie Screams,” an all-Michael Jackson cover group with a name that unfortunately matched their level of talent. Not only had the song been cut from their mash-up that year, so had the accompanying dance moves suggested by a local choreographer they had hired at Aubrey’s suggestion, which had them all in stitches during rehearsals.

As they dance together in the four-foot space between the table and their bed, howling along every time the chorus comes through, Beca finds herself with the kind of grin on her face that only Chloe can put there. They’re being absolute dorks, and she would die if anyone ever saw this, but when she’s here with Chloe, just the two of them, she secretly likes being the matching half to the goofball that is Chloe Beale.

When the song finishes, in the time it takes for them to catch their breath, a slower mix starts to play. Chloe doesn’t recognise it at all, but she does recognise the slight flush that creeps up Beca’s neck to meet her already-red face. It’s one of Beca’s features that she sees often and knows well.

“I can turn it off,” Beca scrambles, reaching for her laptop.

“No, don’t.” Chloe puts her hand out to slow the brunette down, closes her eyes and sways in time to the music. After a couple of seconds, as if it’s the most natural thing in the world, she grabs Beca’s hand and pulls her closer, placing her other hand around the girl’s waist.

“Dance with me,” she instructs again, this time softer as she sways and Beca is forced to follow the movement of the older girl’s hand wrapped around her body. She gives into it just as easily as the last time, knowing that when it comes to Chloe Beale, she will never say no. She tucks her head into Chloe’s collarbone, finding the space under her chin a perfect fit.

“Chlo?” After a few seconds Beca looks up and falls deep into the ocean of the taller girl’s gaze.

“I think I might love you, Beca Mitchell,” Chloe states, as simply as if she were announcing that it’s going to rain tomorrow.

And because it is Chloe and everything with Chloe is simple, and Chloe has always been the one Beca thinks of first when she is happy, or sad, or sees a puppy, and because Chloe is the one who makes her dance like nobody is watching, and pushes her boundaries to the point Beca doesn’t know where they are anymore, and because Chloe is the biggest fan of her music even when it’s just bones and no meat, and because she would give anything to put a smile on the redhead’s face, and because when a song like this comes on around Chloe her first instinct is to turn it off and run away, Beca thinks she might love Chloe too.

“Okay,” she responds, not quite ready for anything more when the truth is still hitting her in waves of light and rainbow colors, much like Chloe herself.

“Okay.” Chloe repeats, and because it is Beca she doesn’t push.

_________

Amy comes down the corridor to find soft music coming from behind their door. It’s not something any of them would normally listen to, but then again she wouldn’t normally turn the handle to be greeted with the sight of Beca’s back, pressed into Chloe’s body as they rock back and forth in time to the music. Chloe lifts her head as she sees the door open, pressing a finger to her lips, silently begging Amy to just not be Amy for once and let them have this moment.

Beca hasn’t noticed the new arrival, or if she has she’s too enamoured by whatever she’s found in Chloe’s collarbone to move her head away. As tempting as it is to bound in and yell something about finally catching them after all these years, there’s something in Chloe’s eyes which makes Amy take pity on the girl. This might be her apartment, but everyone has always known it’s Chloe and Beca – even if they were too stupid to realise it – and she wasn’t about to be the one to stop Beca from finally getting a clue.

“You owe me,” she mouths to Chloe silently, winking as the door clicks shut in front of her. 

_________

Beca leans away for a moment only to drown in Chloe’s eyes once more. Although she has so many questions and so few answers, she presses her lips to Chloe’s gently, swaying in time with a song that is no longer playing.


End file.
